BHOC: DC COMICS PRESENTS #14

Another new series that I was given access to for the first time was DC COMICS PRESENTS, the Superman-led team-up title that had been launched during the hoopla of the SUPERMAN THE MOVIE film. I was aware of the book, having seen the many ads for its launch issue, which co-stared my favorite hero, the Flash. But no issues ever made their way to my local 7-11. As I’ve mentioned before, that location had stopped getting in any newly-launched series as well as any oversized issues such as Annuals, so that meant that I missed quite a few things if I didn’t inadvertently run into them at some other outlet. But my new Stationery Store location made that a thing of the past. And so I was only too happy to pick up this issue, #14, when it turned up there during one of my weekly trips.

I could tell right away that this was the second part of a continuing story, though it would be literally decades before I’d finally get to experience the issue before this one and find out just how matters had gotten to this point. That said, I had no difficulty picking up the threads of the plot jumping in at this point. And no wonder–this was more of a sequel to last month’s issue than a direct continuation. The work was put together by a reliable creative team: writer Paul Levitz and artist Dick Dillin (whom I knew and loved from JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA) ably inked by Dick Giordano, all under the watchful eye of my editor of preference, Julie Schwartz. This was the epitome of a DC title of the period, of a sort that was beginning to vanish: consistent, reliable, steady.

After a quasi-symbolic splash page that features Superboy smashing his way through the Welcome to Smallville sign, the action gets under way in Metropolis, where Clark Kent and Lois Lane are attending the trial of the Sidecar Bandits, a bit of minor continuity as the Bandits had shown up in a recent issue of SUPERMAN.

BHOC: SUPERMAN #336

Lois is bored by the slow proceedings and walks out–just seconds before Superboy comes barreling in through the roof and clobbers Clark Kent. Kent is confused both by how Superboy can be here simultaneous with his present time self and why the Boy of Steel has such a mad-on for him, but he swiftly changes into his Superman togs and fights back. But the Man of Steel is surprised by the intensity of his younger self’s attack, and is unable to prevent Superboy from taking off, though promising to return and finish what he’d started here. Both Superman and Lois are confused by all of this.

After establishing that Clark Kent is all right, Superman heads out after his young doppelganger, but is unable to find any trace of him. Some time later, though, he picks up the ultrasonic sound of Jimmy Olsen’s signal watch, sending a danger alert. Following the signal back to its source, Superman is ambushed by Superboy, who is able to stun him with a Kryptonite-firing bazooka. When the Man of Steel comes to, he’s chained up in the Grand Canyon in kryptonite chains, and a group of his closest friends has been gathered to serve as his jury, as Superboy intends to put his older self on trial. (I have no idea how Superboy managed to chain Superman up with kryptonite chains without being stricken himself–the story seems to imply that this mind-swapped version of Superboy isn’t vulnerable to kryptonite, which seems a stretch.)

To begin with, Superboy reveals himself to all assembled. He’s not really Superboy at all, but rather the Boy of Steel’s old friend Pete Ross who had used a time-ray of Luthor’s to pull Superboy’s body to the present and swap minds with it. This apparently was enough to short-circuit the guiding temporal principle that Superman couldn’t exist in two places at the same time. Pete did this because last issue, Superman was forced by fate and circumstances to let Pete’s son Jon go off into space with some aliens on a journey of vital importance to the history of the 30th Century according to the Legion of Super Heroes. But Pete isn’t having it, and so he’d dedicated his fortune to seeing that Superman pay for his crimes. However, when all of this is laid out for the jury of Superman’s friends, they all to a man stand behind the Man of Steel’s decision, trusting that he did the right thing as he always has. This pisses Pete off, and he decides to kill Superman anyway–but the Man of Tomorrow is able to find enough strength in him to rip his chains out and avoid Pete’s kryptonite shell.

Elsewhere, in Smallville, we find Pete Ross with the mind of Superboy tied up in Luthor’s lab. Pete/Superboy is able to free himself, but without his super-powers, he’s not sure what he can do to stop Pete in his body. Making his way to Ma and Pa Kent’s boarded up old house, he find little left to work with apart from an old whistle. But that’s all he needs. Back at the Grand Canyon, Superboy has soared up into space, intending to rain down kryptonite meteorites atop Superman and friends to finish them off–when suddenly he’s attacked by Krypto the Superdog. Pete’s unprepared for the savage attack, and Krypto is able to knock him back into the atmosphere and back down to Earth where Superman has liberated himself from the kryptonite chains. Now that he’s ready for Superboy, Pete Ross doesn’t stand a chance against him.

And in a final page epilogue, we learn that Superboy/Pete was the one that summoned Krypto with the whistle that he’d recovered. Superman is able to use Luthor’s tech to restore Superboy and Pete’s minds to their proper bodies and to send his younger self back to the past. But the question of what to do about Pete Ross’s homicidal tendencies remains (especially since he knows that Superman is also Clark Kent. That’s the note that the story goes out on–and it does feel like a bit of an ignominious end to Pete Ross’s career as a supporting character, not that it bothered me at the time. To the contrary, it felt meaningful and impactful, a genuine change to a long-established status quo. And a later issue of DC COMICS PRESENTS would resolve Pete and Jon’s story, so there was still that to come.